Dad’s 79 Trans Am

[89 MJ]

I swear @eaglescout526 and I don’t deliberately copy each other. My Dad was offered this car from the bus driver that my brother and I had through school for a price he could not pass up. 
 

What we know now:

The PO bought the car in 1980. 
It has somewhere around 31k actual miles. 
The car has been sitting for at least 20 years. 
It has a 403, automatic, limited slip rear, rear drum brakes, AC, tilt column, cruise control, power windows, power locks, and the Body by Fisher T-Tops (the Smokey and the Bandit cars had the Hurst T-Tops). 
The car did get painted sometime

in the very early 80s due to hail damage. 
 

Cowl tag decode:

The A in the trim tag means it was built the first week of the month, but I can’t read the month which is the character before that.

2FS87 is Pontiac Firebird 2 door coupe

N is the Norwood, OH plant

196129 is the Fisher body number

Based on the pictures and seeing the N on the far left of the tag right above the screw, I believe the interior is 12N Oyster Vinyl

15L is Platinum poly on the lower body

15U is Platinum poly on the upper body

L is lacquer based paint

A51 bucket seats

CC1 is removable hatch roof

A31 power windows

WS4 just means trans am

Not sure what GR2 is

 

Now here’s the weird part about the car:

It has the 15x8 snowflake wheels that were typically reserved for the WS6 special handling package cars. Because this car has rear drums, we know it is not a WS6. It turns out that there was a WS7 package that was nearly the same as the WS6, but it had drum brakes. Could this be one of the very rare WS7 cars? The build sheet and diameter of the rear sway bar will tell us more, but that will have to wait for a little while. 
 

What it needs:

It has old paint and sat uncovered in a garage (which likely saved it), but it needs buffed

The radiator leaks

The exhaust system needs replacing

Likely some metal brake lines and all of the rubber ones

New rubber vacuum and fuel lines 

Its safe to assume it’ll have a few leaks that need fixing

 

Pics from inside the PO’s garage:

 

Loading it up:

 

In the trailer:

[fiatslug87]

My next door neighbor growing up had one of those, got to love that dash bezel. Is he keeping it or selling when done?

[hgeranium]

Man y'all have a lot of cars. Looks great

[89 MJ]

8 minutes ago, fiatslug87 said:

My next door neighbor growing up had one of those, got to love that dash bezel. Is he keeping it or selling when done?

They are really neat. He’s planning on keeping it for a while at least. Should make for a decent cruiser. 
 

2 minutes ago, hgeranium said:

Man y'all have a lot of cars. Looks great

Yeah, we do have a collecting problem. It’s a really nice car from the pics I’ve seen. 

[neohic]

That is a SHARP car! 

[eaglescout526]

Lol. Except your dads car is complete and didnt require a tear down if the engine. 

[89 MJ]

26 minutes ago, neohic said:

That is a SHARP car! 

I’m very surprised it’s so nice. 
 

2 minutes ago, eaglescout526 said:

Lol. Except your dads car is complete and didnt require a tear down if the engine. 

Not yet at least. He hasn’t gotten it running yet!

[eaglescout526]

I doubt your dad will have to tear into the engine. Mine rusted out the plugs for the coolant in the head which resulted in the rebuild. His will probably fire right up with no issue. I still need to see if mine is a WS6 which im convinced it is.

[89 MJ]

5 minutes ago, eaglescout526 said:

I doubt your dad will have to tear into the engine. Mine rusted out the plugs for the coolant in the head which resulted in the rebuild. His will probably fire right up with no issue. I still need to see if mine is a WS6 which I'm convinced it is.

That’s the hope! All signs are pointing to yours being a WS6, which is super cool!

[89 MJ]

20 hours ago, 89 MJ said:

Now here’s the weird part about the car:

It has the 15x8 snowflake wheels that were typically reserved for the WS6 special handling package cars. Because this car has rear drums, we know it is not a WS6. It turns out that there was a WS7 package that was nearly the same as the WS6, but it had drum brakes. Could this be one of the very rare WS7 cars? The build sheet and diameter of the rear sway bar will tell us more, but that will have to wait for a little while. 

Case closed, the car is a WS7. 

 

The WS6 and WS7 were special handling packages. In order for the WS7 explanation to make sense, I think I ought to explain WS6 first. 

In 1978, Pontiac debuted the WS6 Performance Package. This consisted of a larger diameter rear sway bar (3/4" instead of the standard 5/8"), tighter steering box gear ratio, GR70-15 raised white letter Goodyear Polysteel Radials, and the 15x8 inch snowflake wheels.

In 1979, Pontiac added rear disc brakes to the WS6 Performance Package. The rear discs were also available as an option on their own with the J65 RPO code, they were not exclusive to the WS6 cars. Because the rear discs were more popular than Pontiac imagined, they actually ran out of disc brake rear ends for a brief while. Rather than halt production on the popular WS6 cars due to the lack of disc brake rear ends, Pontiac came out with the WS7 Performance Package, which was identical to the WS6 package, just with rear drum brakes instead, just like 1978 had. The WS7 was a partial year option, so it is considerably rarer than even the WS6.

 

This is one of those cases where rare doesn't necessarily mean valuable. Because of the handling package, it is probably worth a little bit more than a regular Trans Am, but I wouldn't say that it is probably worth more than a WS6 car. Its also worth mentioning that this is GM rare, not AMC|Jeep rare. Pontiac built 48,488 Trans Ams with a 403 in 79 alone. Its probably safe to assume that there were still a few thousand WS7 cars built. 

 

More pics of the car coming tonight.

[89 MJ]

It lives!

 

[89 MJ]

Also, I forgot to add pics last night, so here they are. 

[89 MJ]

And here’s some build sheet goodness. 

[Pete M]

[89 MJ]

Well, I spoke to Dad last night. He has put together a list of parts that the car needs. 

 

The radiator needs to be cleaned and have the leaks fixed. Being such an unmolested car, he is going to get the original one repaired as GM had date codes and such with their factory radiators.

The water pump leaks, so that needs replacing.

All three brake hoses. The ones on the car are still flexible and have no cracking, but they're original and he wants to be able to drive the car safely.

Brake pads, possibly wheel cylinders.

Carb rebuild kit (the video above was the car running without anything done to the original carb). He plans on pulling the top off and if it looks good inside, he's just going to put an accelerator pump in it because Quadrajets can be finnicky to get perfect.

Belts need replacing because they're all original.

Hoses are also original, so they need replaced.

Battery because it is old.

Grilles need replaced because there were a semi hard rubber that has just crumbled away to nothing.

Window sweeps are all petrified.

Door bumpers because they original and dried up.

Right power window motor doesn't work.

Battery hold down is missing.

 

Honestly, that is not a very long list for a car that has been sitting for decades. It sitting uncovered and jacked up inside a garage probably saved this car. 

 

This should be a nice driving car too. The details for the 403 are as follows: 185hp@3600 RPM, 320ft-lbs torque @2200 RPM, 4.351 x 3.385 bore/stroke, 8.0:1 compression ratio. Not a race engine, but the torque at such low RPM should make it a great driver that feels fairly quick. Behind the 403 is a GM TH350, which are great transmissions. The only notable thing here is that it has the Buick, Oldsmobile, Pontiac (BOP) bellhousing bolt pattern instead of the common Chevy bolt pattern. Behind that is a GM 8.5" 10 bolt with 2.73 gears and a limited slip. This combination should result in decent acceleration, but also keep relatively low RPMs on the highway.